Battlezone (1998)
Battlezone was the first of the Battlezone games, which combines RTS with a first person shooter. The game has two campaigns, one for the American NSDF and other for the Soviet CCA. Storyline/campaign Battlezone is set during the 1960s with an alternative history plot, in which the space race is used to cover up the deployment of the United States and Soviet militaries into space. Both sides have used scraps of extraterrestrial "bio-metal", which have fallen to Earth as meteors, to build vehicles with amazing properties such as hover capability. Both nations deploy into space and are fighting across the solar system to control other deposits of the bio-metal. Gameplay is divided up into two campaigns; one following the American National Space Defense Force (NSDF), the other with the Soviet Cosmic Colonist Army (CCA, also referred to as the Communist Cosmonaut Army in early game manuals).[4][5] The American campaign starts on the Moon, but the NSDF is forced off after the destruction of their main base. They relocate to Mars, but find the Soviets already there. Both sides locate alien artifacts, and the Americans also find a factory; the long-dead alien race that created the bio-metal is identified as the Cthonians, who inhabited the planet Icarus (now the asteroid belt) and visited Earth on several occasions, influencing Greek mythology. The Americans learn of an ultimate weapon called the "Fury" and head to Venus to learn more about it. Another Cthonian relic is recovered, pointing to Jupiter's moon Io. The NSDF finds a third relic, but this is stolen by a scientist defecting to the Soviets. The player must steal a Soviet fighter craft and tap into the communications network, which reveals the CCA relocation to their main base on Saturn's moon Titan. The Americans clear nearby Europa of CCA units to prevent early warning to those on Titan, but the main assault is annihilated, as the Soviets have begun to manufacture Fury vehicles. However, the Furies turn on the Soviets; they are self-aware and programmed to destroy all life. Icarus was destroyed by the Cthonians to prevent the Furies from reaching Earth. The NSDF and CCA ally against the new threat, and after destroying the production factory on Titan, travel to the fictional moon of Achilles, orbiting Uranus. The Americans destroy the main Fury base, but this causes the moon's core to destabilise, and the player must destroy the Furies' evacuation vessel before it escapes, then escape themselves. The Soviet campaign follows the same basic storyline, but from the CCA's perspective. Starting on Venus, the Soviets are hounded off the planet by an NSDF unit called the "Black Dogs". They travel to Io to capture one of the Fury relics, but after the Black Dogs destroy their main base, are forced to regroup and reestablish a foothold. Once this is achieved, the production of Fury units begins, and the CCA uses them to wipe out the Black Dogs in the final mission, just before the Furies turn on them. The Soviet campaign is the shorter of the two, as the NSDF missions were intended as the main game. However, the CCA missions are meant to be more difficult, and the player must manage the full technology tree from the beginning, instead of being gradually introduced over the course of the campaign. An add-on, called The Red Odyssey, was later released with an American and a Chinese campaign. Version History *'1.01': 1998-04-06 *'1.31': 1998-07-16 *'"Large Assets"': 1998-09-23 *'1.4': 1998-10-13 Category:Games